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The Worst Job in Washington

December 30, 2009 1:53 pmDecember 30, 2009 1:53 pm

In the debate over who should get the sack for the “systemic failure” to stop Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab from boarding an American-bound plane, the culpability of the Director of National Intelligence, Dennis Blair, may end up loominglarger than the follies of Janet Napolitano. But Napolitano’s painful television performance over the weekend will remain the defining image of this particular national security foul-up, and her “the system worked” howler the defining line.

Now pause a moment and consider: Why on earth did she ever take this job? As Reihan Salam noted yesterday, it was only a year ago that Napolitano was being “touted by many as a potential running mate for Obama or as a giant-killer who could defeat John McCain in a Senate race.” Back then she was the successful Democratic governor of a Republican-tilting state, with two years left on her term and plenty of political opportunities ahead of her. Now she’s the second promising politician to have her national reputation defined, and then devoured, by her service in Washington’s most thankless Cabinet position. Like Tom Ridge before her, she went into DHS a rising star, and she’ll probably come out a joke.

The head of Homeland Security has three major public roles: To warn Americans about plots that probably won’t come to fruition (Ridge’s specialty — remember the duct tape?), to stand up and accept the blame for plots that the government has failed to stop, and to attempt to reassure the public during devastating natural disasters. (Only the spectacular incompetence of Michael Brown saved Michael Chertoff from becoming the face of Hurricane Katrina.) In each case, the job requires taking ownership of massive problems where much of the crucial work is being done outside your shop — by the CIA, the NSA and the military in the case of counterterrorism, and by state and local governments in the case of natural disasters. Everyone who works for the President has to know that they’re more likely to be a fall guy than a hero. But when you’re the head of DHS, your chances of taking blame are particularly astronomical, and your chances of getting credit are particularly low.

This makes it a perfect job for a good-soldier type (Chertoff, a former judge and prosecutor, fit this bill reasonably well) or a career bureaucrat — somebody who’s likely to take pride in wrestling a byzantine department toward efficiency, and who doesn’t mind being mocked as an alarmist one day and an incompetent the next. It’s a lousy gig, though, for a rising-star politician, especially one who has any ambition to hold public office again once they’ve left DHS behind. By tapping Napolitano, Obama did her a disservice, and cost the Democratic Party a potential Senator from Arizona. By accepting, she may have accepted the death of her political career. The next successful governor to be offered the job should take note, and say no.

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Ross Douthat joined The New York Times as an Op-Ed columnist in April 2009. Previously, he was a senior editor at the Atlantic and a blogger for theatlantic.com. He is the author of "Privilege: Harvard and the Education of the Ruling Class" (Hyperion, 2005) and the co-author, with Reihan Salam, of "Grand New Party: How Republicans Can Win the Working Class and Save the American Dream" (Doubleday, 2008). He is the film critic for National Review.